speare's play existed in any form before the publication of the translation from Plautus. Of internal evidence upon this subject there is very little, and that not of much weight. Dromio's reply to Antipholus, Act III. Sc. 2, that he found France in the forehead of the globe-like dame who asserted uxorial rights over him, "armed and reverted,* making war against her heir," is, however, so plainly a punning allusion to the war of the League, which was closed by Henry IV.'s apostasy in 1593, that there can hardly be a doubt as to the existence of the passage before that date. For although it is true that heire' might be a misprint or loose spelling of haire,' to which it is changed in the folio of 1632, the allusion yet exists in as full force, in the otherwise senseless words "armed and reverted, making war," and the pun remains with a different spelling. The likeness between the phraseology of the translated Menæchmi and The Comedy of Errors is very slight indeed; and all other similarity is due, of course, to the original. Adriana says, Act II. Sc. 1, "poor I am but his stale," and the Wife in the translated Menæchmi says, "He makes me a stale and a laughing stock": W. W. translates, nunc ibo in tabernam: vasa et argentum tibi Referam," "Ile go strait to the Inne, and deliver up my accounts, and all your stuffe," and Antipholus of Syracuse says, "Come to the Centaur; fetch our stuff from thence;" and although 'stuff' and 'stale' were generally used in Shakespeare's time as they are here used, in these speeches they have somewhat the air of reminiscences. That the author of The Comedy of Errors knew the story of the Menæchmi, needs, of course, no setting forth; but that he had studied it closely, either in the original or in a translation, is evident from similarity in minor points between the plays. In both the resident brother is married; in both the wife is shrewish; in both she has brought her husband a large dowry; in both the Courtesan appears; and in both the resident brother seeks refuge at her table from the jealous clamors of his wife; the incident of the chain is common to both, and is used by each dramatist, though with a difference, for the same purpose; in *A misprint, left uncorrected here, will be noticed hereafter. mean both the wandering brother gives his purse to his servant to be carried to the inn; in both the wife, on account of the behavior of his double, finally supposes her husband to be lunatic, and in the one case sends and in the other brings a leech to take him in charge, who in both encounters the husband himself. It is also noteworthy that in the first stage directions of the original, one Antipholus is called "Errotis" and the other "Sereptus," -misprints, doubtless, for Erraticus' and 'Surreptus,' ing 'wandering' and 'stolen.' Now, in The Comedy of Errors the resident brother is not stolen, but in the Menæchmi he is, and is designated as Surreptus; and the traveller, who is not called Erraticus in Plautus' Dramatis Personæ, but Sosicles, is, however, called the Traveller' in W. W.'s translation. This translation, although not published until 1595, had then been made and handed about for some time, as we know by the address of "The Printer to the Readers" which introduces it. In this he says, or, without doubt, the author for him, "The writer hereof (loving Readers) having diverse of this Poettes Comedies Englished, for the use and delight of his private friends, who in Plautus owne words are not able to understand them: I have prevailed so far with him as to let this one go farther abroad," &c. In the absence of evidence which amounts to proof, we may yet form an opinion; and my own, based upon a consideration of the facts just stated and of the play itself, is, that Shakespeare, at the very beginning of his dramatic career, wishing to supply his theatre with an amusing comedy to take the place of a rude imitation of the Menæchmi, already somewhat known to the public, read that play in the original as thoroughly as his small Latin" (small in the estimation of so complete a scholar as Jonson) enabled him to read it; that he also read W. W.'s translation in manuscript; and that then, using for the more comic parts the doggerel verse in which the elder play was written, for the passages of sentiment the alternate rhymes of which Venus and Adonis and Romeo and Juliet show his early preference and his mastery, and for the serious Scenes the blank verse which he was the first to bring to perfection, and which appears in great though not yet matured beauty in The Two Gentlemen of Verona, he wrote The Comedy of Errors: that, in the extravagant Scenes, he deliberately imitated, populo ut placeret, the versification of the old play, and perhaps adopted some of it with improvement; that this was done about 1589-90; and that the play thus produced may have been somewhat rewritten by him in its first and last Scenes in the long period during which it remained unprinted in the possession of the theatre. It is to be observed that although the poetical value of The Two Gentlemen of Verona is much greater than that of The Comedy of Errors, the dramatic arrangement of the latter is much more skilful, and indicates longer theatrical experience on the part of the author. The difference between the comedy of the Latin and that of the English dramatist is very wide, both in the way of addition and alteration; the most important addition being that of another pair of twins as attendants upon those who figure in the Latin play. The introduction of these tends greatly to complicate the confusion out of which the fun of this extravaganza arises. Whether the thought was original with Shakespeare or was taken from the old play, we have no means of ascertaining; but in the use made of the bondsmen we recognize the younger hand of him in whose maturer works his perception of the ridiculous and enjoyment of the broadest humor are no less apparent than his delight in all that is grand and beautiful in Man and Nature. Yet the very passages in which the Dromios are most prominent are those which seem most unmistakably the production of an inferior and more ancient writer. How difficult is it to believe that the rhyming part of Act III. Sc. 1, for instance, was written, at any time or for any purpose, by the author of the fine blank verse which precedes and follows it! It is more than possible that the two slaves were added in the older play to doubly supply the clown or buffoon, without which, on our ancient stage, a comedy was not a comedy. In the substitution of Luciana, the sister of Adriana, for the Father of the Latin comedy, we very surely have an indication of Shakespeare's dramatic skill; the expostulations which he puts into the mouth of the young woman are far more convincing and to the purpose than the reproaches which Plautus makes the old man deal out to both husband and wife. The introduction of Luciana also enabled the author to establish, in the relations between her and Antipholus of Syracuse, a new interest entirely wanting to the Latin play. The Parasite, who figures so largely in the Menæchmi, as in all Latin comedies, is omitted, as a character altogether foreign to the taste of an English audience, and needless to the production of that confusion which is the only motive of Shakespeare's play; in which, too, the action is more intricate than in its model, the movement more rapid, and the spirit much more lively, light, and humorous. Concerning the place and the period of the action of this play, it seems that Shakespeare did not trouble himself to form a very accurate idea. The Ephesus of The Comedy of Errors is much like the Bohemia of The Winter's Tale - a remote, unknown place, yet with a familiar and imposing name, and therefore well suited to the purposes of one who as poet and dramatist cared much for men and little for things, and to whose perception the accidental was entirely eclipsed by the essential. Anachronisms are scattered through it with a profusion which could only be the result of entire indifference - in fact, of an absolute want of thought upon the subject. The existence of an abbey in Ephesus, however, is not to be considered as among them. For Christianity was established there about the middle of the fourth century; and Ephesus remained a Greek and Christian city till about A. D. 1313. The action of the play may, perhaps, be referred to about the middle of this period. The choice of costume is in a great measure arbitrary. The twins must of course be attired in pairs alike, else they could not be mistaken for each other; and the improbability, extending to impossibility, that one master and servant should arrive in Ephesus dressed just as their doubles were on the day of their arrival, is a postulate permitted in the construction of a farce like this. Any ancient Natolian costume is admissible for the principal characters; and dramatic propriety will not be violated by giving to Balthasar and the friend of Antipholus of Syracuse the dress of Italian merchants, and to Pinch that of an English schoolmaster, or leech, or conjurer of Shakespeare's day. But an entirely conventional costume may be adopted; the only object being to remove the action out of the present and the actual. The text, the only source of which is the first folio, exists there in a state approaching purity, the errors being altogether due to the accidents of the printing office, and, generally, easy of correction. Some were, however, left to be for the first time rectified in this edition. DRAMATIS PERSONÆ. SOLINUS, Duke of Ephesus. ÆGEON, a Merchant of Syracuse. ANTIPHOLUS of Ephesus, Twin Brothers, Sons to ANTIPHOLUS of Syracuse, Egeon and Æmilia. DROMIO of Ephesus, Twin Brothers, Attendants on DROMIO of Syracuse, S the two Antipholuses. BALTHAZAR, a Merchant. ANGELO, a Goldsmith. A Merchant, Friend to Antipholus of Syracuse. PINCH, a Schoolmaster. EMILIA, Wife to Egeon. ADRIANA, Wife to Antipholus of Ephesus. LUCIANA, her Sister. LUCE, Servant to Adriana. A Courtezan. Gaoler, Officers, and other Attendants. SCENE: Ephesus. (140) |